Frostbite due to the cold on the Matterhorn is not an accident. The Federal Court decided that.
KEYSTONE
An alpinist suffers frostbite while descending the Matterhorn and loses several toes and fingers. The Federal Court ruled in the final instance that accident insurance does not have to cover this.
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- A mountaineer loses several toes and phalanges due to frostbite while descending the Matterhorn.
- The accident insurance does not classify this as an accident and does not cover the costs of rescue and care.
- As a final instance, the Federal Court decided that the insurance company was acting correctly.
The descent from the Matterhorn ended in hospital for a then 38-year-old alpinist and continued in court. In October 2021 he will climb the traditional Schmid route through the north face with a rope partner.
It wasn’t until the following day that the two of them got off. At half past six in the morning they arrive at the Solvay Hut, an emergency hut at 4,003 meters above sea level, and go to sleep, as the “Walliser Bote” writes.
They wake up around midday and pose severe frostbite on hands and feet. They can no longer get off like this. You alert the rescue team and are flown directly to the hospital in a helicopter.
Five toes were completely amputated and four fingers were partially amputated
The 38-year-old is hit particularly hard. Doctors have to amputate all of the toes on his right foot. He also lost limbs of one finger on his left hand and three fingers on his right hand.
The next shock comes a little later: the Basel insurance company, where the man is insured against accidents, refuses to cover the costs. What happened was not an accident. The Valais messenger summarizes the insurance company’s decision that his impairments, with only five toes and six entire fingers, are not accident-like injuries.
The federal Social Security Act defines an accident as “a sudden, unintentional damaging impact of an unusual external factor on the human body, which results in impairment of physical, mental or psychological health or death.”
Federal Court: Cold is not an accident
The man defends himself in court, loses and takes the case to federal court. But this also proves the insurance company right. The cold was neither sudden nor unusual for this place and time of year.
The court obtained precise weather data for the period from MeteoSwiss. This means that a thunderstorm, which the mountaineer says suddenly appeared, can also be ruled out.
The Federal Court therefore dismissed the alpinist’s complaint against the lower court’s ruling. The accident insurance rightly didn’t pay. The losing party now also has to pay additional court costs of 800 francs.
2024-03-31 18:56:04
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